Bed Bug Update

Here’s the last bit of, well, not really bad news. More like a caution. Bed bugs are notoriously hard to kill. Don’t be surprised if weeks after you’ve treated your home, during which you’ve seen no sign of the intruders, you suddenly wake up one morning with a bite or two.

Our original infestation occurred in April. After three months of sleeping easy, I woke up August 18th to discover I’d been bitten. Once. Since then, every few days I’ve been bitten again. We’ve re-treated the bed and the furniture on either side. I’ve treated the chair I sit in most often. Yet, I’m still finding the occasional bite. It doesn’t feel like an infestation, it’s more like one or two hardy souls that have found a spot safely out of reach of the steam, spray and DE.

We’re about to resort to a bed bug trap. In case you need it, here’s how you make one:

Get a plastic pet food dish, the sort that when turned upside down forms a “moat” and a central island. Tape the outside of the food dish with masking tape, painter’s tape or something of the sort. The idea is to make it rough enough that a bed bug can climb up it. Fill the moat with 1/2 inch of DE.

Find a thermos or drinking bottle that has a nozzle that can be left open. Something like this:

You need something that can be opened and that has a nozzle you can leave up, in the open position. Fill the bottle with dry ice, leave the nozzle open, and set the bottle in the center island of the upside down pet food dish. Now leave this on or very near the bed or other piece of furniture you think the bug(s) may be hiding in. Sleep somewhere else. The dry ice will release carbon dioxide as it dissolves, which hopefully will attract the bed bugs, who will mountaineer up the side and fall into the DE, ready to be terminated in whatever fashion you choose. (My roommate is big on confining them in a Ziploc bag and throwing them in the freezer!)